Airline boarding passes are used by travelers to gain access to the secured regions of airport terminals prior to aircraft boarding. In a process familiar to travelers, a boarding pass is obtained prior to entering the secured region of an airport terminal. Typically, a traveler receives a boarding pass after presenting suitable identification and confirming his/her flight reservation information during a flight check-in process at an airport ticket counter or kiosk. Recently, airlines also have begun distributing boarding passes to travelers electronically, such as when a traveler makes flight reservations online, and checks in for the flight and print out his/her boarding pass before arriving at the airport. Some airlines are now distributing boarding passes directly to smartphones of travelers.
When a traveler passes through the security portal separating the unsecured and secured regions of an airport terminal, a security agent carefully checks to ensure that the traveler is carrying a valid boarding pass. The security agent typically validates the name of the traveler on the boarding pass, e.g., by comparing the name against a valid form of identification having a photograph, such as a driver's license or passport of the traveler. The security agent also typically confirms that the boarding pass is valid for that particular date and place, and a traveler having a boarding pass for a flight on different date or from a different airport is not permitted to pass through the security portal. Additionally, boarding passes are now required to include two-dimensional (2D) barcodes, which automate, simplify, and streamline the flight boarding process, thereby preventing long queues while ensuring that each traveler is boarding the correct flight.
As a result, every person within the secured region of an airport must possess a valid boarding pass. Thus, disadvantageously, while every person is required to carry a boarding pass in order to gain access to the secured region of the airport and to board the flight, the boarding pass is only used for these purposes.